Sierra Leone still needs British after peaceful poll

By Tim Butcher in Adonkia

Backed by Britain: Sierra Leone will still receive assistance

12:01AM BST 15 May 2002

Sierra Leoneans have voted in peace after more than a decade of war, but yesterday's presidential and parliamentary elections are unlikely to herald the end of Britain's involvement in the everyday life of the shattered West African state.

Despite some stone-throwing and scuffles between President Ahmad Tejan Kabbah's supporters and those of rival parties, the campaign was among the most peaceful since independence from Britain in 1961.

Despite the apparent success of the vote, British troops, administrators and cash will still be needed to prop up the Freetown administration.

Britain's involvement in Sierra Leone is not only its widest in West Africa since it left its colonies there in the 1960s, but also arguably the most extensive by any of the former colonial powers in countries they once ruled.

It is the largest bilateral provider of aid - £50 million a year - with British troops, police and accountants placed in senior jobs inside the Sierra Leonean administration. Few expect them to be able to leave for many years to come.

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Alan Jones, the British High Commissioner, said: "We are here because the Sierra Leoneans want us to be here.

"Nobody has accused us of neo-colonialism. We don't run the army, we have a military adviser, the inspector-general of police is British . . . We are involved in security sector reform and we are focusing on good governance."

Insiders say resentment against the British is building in some quarters, not least among corrupt army officers, policemen and government officials.

The deployment also saved a United Nations mission in crisis, paralysed by poor leadership and incompetent troops, many of whom had been taken prisoner by mobs of rebel soldiers.

But Britain will not be able simply to withdraw from Sierra Leone now that the election is over. Many believe that the fighting, fomented by the country's neighbours, Liberia and Guinea, would start again if the international community pulled out.

The problems of corruption and government mismanagement which sparked the civil war in 1991 are still a long way from being addressed. Only when they have been resolved will long-term stability be created.

That is necessary before Britain can withdraw with a realistic hope that the benefits of its intervention will be maintained.